Tag: Women

“There’s nothing like having a daughter for turning you into a feminist,” remarked a parishioner after a sermon I gave sometime ago. While I remember neither the specific statement I made nor exactly when this exchange occurred, I vividly remember thinking, “I really hope I was a feminist before we had a daughter. Maybe I haven’t been as strong and vocal an advocate for and with women as I thought?”

Girls are the secret weapon in the war on poverty. But only if they’re protected and educated. – Mercy Corps’ A Girl Can

However, on this International Women’s Day (March 8) it is all too tragically clear that simply having a daughter – or a sister or an aunt or a wife or a friend or a cousin or a mother – is not enough to transform people into feminists*:

Wold Chicago is hosting a great event today. My mom and my wife are attending it. Hopefully I can get them to share about the event in a future post. (Full disclosure: World Chicago’s Executive Director, Peggy Parfenoff, is a long-time family friend.)

A girl who can read teaches her mother to read, tells her brothers about women’s rights, and makes school a priority for her own children. – Mercy Corps’ A Girl Can

In the spirit of ONE’s idea #5: Looking back on my formative years, before I knew terms like feminist, advocate, empowerment, equality, or gendered roles, I knew that our family didn’t always fit the usual mode. Sure, Mom cooked most of the meals. But Dad did the laundry and we all helped clean the house.

Mom and Dad had the same level of education and both worked similar full-time, outside-of-the-home jobs.

Dad painstakingly worked to keep all the landscaping immaculate. He knew every flower, plant, tree, and (horrors!) weed. Mom was the one with the collection of sports trophies for softball, basketball and bowling. The Sports Illustrated subscription came to her. It was a big accomplishment the day when teenaged Dave finally beat Mom at ping-pong for the first time. Teaching me to throw, catch and hit a baseball? Mom did that. Learning proper form and release shooting hoops? That came from Mom. Scoring bowling by hand? Reading a box score in the newspaper? Correctly marking each play on the baseball score card? Mom, Mom, and Mom again.

Thank you, Mom (and Dad) for teaching me strength, partnership, and equality simply by being who you are. I love you. I hope Joann and I can pass on those lessons to both our son and our daughter.

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After months and even years of delay, the U.S. House of Representatives FINALLYpassed the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) – and with it the Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act (TVPRA)!

We recognize that family violence and abuse in all its forms—verbal, psychological, physical, sexual—is detrimental to the covenant of the human community. – UMC Social Principles 161.G

The bill had already passed the Senate and President Obama has said he will sign it right away. Most of the news I saw about this focused on how the main bill protects all women, including native Americans, undocumented immigrants and LGBT women. As Rep. Gwen Moore (D-WI), herself a rape victim, sharply put it with a paraphrase of 19th century escaped slave and civil rights advocate, Sojourner Truth, “Ain’t they women?”

Yes. Yes, they are.

But the VAWA also included the TVPRA as an amendment. TVPA expired over two years ago; we finally have it back! What’s that mean? I’ll let two of our best anti-trafficking partners – Polaris Project and International Justice Mission – tell you.

This bill sets important funding benchmarks, encourages distribution of the National Human Trafficking Hotline number by federal agencies, establishes grant programs for state agencies to assist child victims of sex trafficking, strengthens the ability to prosecute those who fraudulently hire individuals in foreign labor contracts, and more. [read the rest]

IJM adds that the 2013 version of the TVPRA has new provisions as well:

Gives the State Department authority to partner with overseas governments to stop child trafficking in targeted areas. It’s much more specific and measurable than previous programs

An emergency response provision helps the State Department quickly deploy teams of experts into crisis areas—like the situation in Haiti after the 2010 earthquake—where disorder and poverty can leave children or other vulnerable poor especially susceptible to trafficking.

New tools to help prosecute traffickers and people who exploit the poor.

Continued support for existing programs that support survivors of trafficking both in the U.S. and overseas. [read the rest]

After this victory, as President Bartlett used to ask, What’s next?
Time to talk hunger again, that’s what.

Watch the trailer. But be careful, the trailer does its job – you will want to see the whole movie. Good thing then A Place at the Table is available right now On Demand and through iTunes. Find A Place at the Table on Facebook and Twitter.

UPDATE: Check out pictures from CAASE’s rising in Daley Plaza. A friend who works downtown declared, “They made quite the ruckus today!”

Since I can’t be with them, I contemplated recording a little dance on my own…but thought better of it. I’m not afraid to look like an idiot (which I would), I’ve been in youth ministry for two decades now. Looking like an idiot is part of the job description. No, I thought better of it because I want you to keep reading, not run away in horror never to return. I thought better of it because I don’t want to even give the appearance of making light of this effort.

I urge you to contact your Congress persons right now, today about these acts. Our mothers, our sisters, our daughters, our wives, our grandmothers, our friends are fully human and must be treated as such.

UPDATE 2: As I prepared a version of this post for my church blog I thought about how complicit the church is in perpetuating the mistreatment of women. Here’s what I wrote about that:

Yes, it’s true, the culture in which the bible was written treated women as property, as little more than baby-making machines (more sons, please). But that was two and three and four thousand years ago. Don’t we know better by now?

The church as far too often led the way in treating women terribly. We’re not just talking ancient history here either. Still today, far too many churches tell women their only place is in the home completing domestic chores. Far too many churches still tell women their only important role the only role allowed is that of wife and mother. Still today, far too many churches tell women it is sinful to leave their abusive husband. All of that must stop!

Instead of me being goofy, I offer you this incredible video. Watch it then do a little dance and make a little noise to end violence against women and human trafficking.

77 women now in the U.S. House of Representatives, a record (and possible another depending on how Arizona turns out).

20 women in the U.S. Senate, a record.

The first openly gay Senator.

The first Asian-American female Senator.

More great moments caught on video…

1. Celebrating the victory for equality in Minnesota (via Upworthy). Fast forward to about the 2:30 mark for the best part.

2. President Obama saying thank you to campaign workers. There is just something about telling people you are proud of them that is overwhelmingly emotional. I often get this way talking with our youth group after a big accomplishment.

3. Finally, this from Rachel Maddow. I couldn’t agree more. Our country needs a viable conservative voice to be part of the conversation and debate about how to create the best policies. Our country needs a conservative voice that isn’t obsessed with white privilege. A voice that isn’t anti-women, anti-gay, anti-nonwhites. Reasonable conservatives, please come back to us!

I love the scores and scores of teachers, doctors, clerks, nurses, crossing guards, baristas, writers, musicians… all those with whom I’ve crossed paths at some point in my life.

Where would I be without all these women in my life?

Our daughter being affectionate, melting my heart.

These are the people I think of when I read and hear and see politicians making deplorable, unconscionable, hateful, degrading, minimizing, ignorant, misogynistic statements about women.

These are the people I think of, these people whom I love. These people whom I know, these people about whom I care. I hear these statements, I think of all the women in my life And. I. Seethe. With. Anger.

Any and all – be they male or female, politician or religious leader, or anything else – any and all who seek to create a world in which our daughter and all these women are treated by law or by custom as anything less than fully human are my mortal enemies.

I hear these statements that insult and disparage women and I want to curse profusely like Quad City Pat did. For, as my friend Richard said, “How can you not react without such language?”

I hear these statements that treat women as less that fully human and I want to lay them out so all the world will see their abiding hideousness like Brainwrap did. Twice. That’s right, there are enough such statements to fill two charts and maybe more. Think about that.

I hear these statements and I want the men who made them to be ridiculed, debased, exposed. Like Stephen did. That’s satire at its absolute best: demonstrating beyond a shadow of a doubt that the emperor has no clothes. That’s what comedy is for: empowering the oppressed against the hegemon.

“My name is Marcia. I am 43 years old and I am a rape survivor,” she writes. “I am writing to you because I’ve learned that silence can be deadly for rape survivors when it goes on too long… What I need to say is STOP! Stop using rape as a political weapon, as a chess piece in this game of survivor, as a way to call out your opponent. Stop.”

Marcia concludes:

If you want to hear our stories, the cacophonous voices of those who actually live these truths, then you’ve got to stop speaking for us. You do not speak for me. You do not speak to me—not those of you who say rape is a part of God’s plan, not those of you who say “see, they don’t care about women’s health care.” Your words cut through me. Your words remind me how small my world becomes when the truths of those who have been there fall silent.

And that brought me up short. I love my wife, my daughter, my mom and all the rest and I am still seething with anger. But I don’t want to be part of the problem. I’m going to shut up and try to make space for Marcia and all those who are victims of sexual assault.

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Yesterday’s Chicago Tribune had one of the better articles I’ve read on local efforts to fight human trafficking. Our friends at CAASE (Chicago Alliance Against Sexual Exploitation) even get a shout out!

Inside the Harrison Police District station, the officers sat in a semicircle to be briefed about the shift ahead in one of Chicago’s most beleaguered areas.

But on this recent day, the topic was not the shootings and murders on these West Side streets, but a crime often pushed far back into the shadows — the thousands of young girls and women who are prostituted, pushed into the violence of Chicago’s sex trade.

FBI Special Agent Jonathan Williamson and Chicago police Sgt. Traci Walker were there to announce a new joint effort by the FBI and Chicago police to target child traffickers in the city.

“Our main goal here is to go after guys pimping out juvenile girls or putting any underage juveniles into the sex trade,” Williamson said. “Certainly, most, if not all, (investigations) are going to start with you guys on the street.” Read the rest.

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Welcome to my version of that blog post staple, the weekly recap/links roundup/info dump. My intent is to highlight stuff I came across this week (or, you know, at least fairly recently) that I found well-written or inspiring or bizarre or…well, or perhaps stuff so good I wish I’d written it myself. I suspect blogging deity, Fred Clark (aka Slacktivist) will feature prominently here.

Enough preamble! On with the Well said! list!

1. I’m just going to go ahead and admit this: I’d never heard of the country of Bahrain until maybe two weeks ago. Call me a stereotypically ignorant USAmerican, I guess. But I know now. Pretty sure I could even find it on a map.

The last few weeks I couldn’t hardly pull myself away from the coverage of the protests in Egypt. I was especially moved by their non-violent nature. Is there anything more inspiring than sucessful non-violent protest and revolution?

But what is also appalling — arguably, more appalling — is the reflexive objectification of a woman who has been violently violated. To read these comments and the many more like them circulating the web, it is easy to forget that we are talking about a real attack upon a real woman who must now grapple with real consequences. It’s as if some feel Logan’s tragedy exists only as a vehicle for them to score political points.

2. Speaking of Egypt, this is a few weeks old now, but I still think it’s amazing. She was right. They didn’t leave until Mubarak was gone. That’s some serious strength. Via Sojourners

The combination of stupidity, selfishness and resentment for resentment’s sake here is an unholy abomination that makes me want to scream and throw things. And I would, if I thought screaming and throwing things would help get through to these folks, but at this point I have no idea what would get through to them. Neither facts nor faith seem to matter to them at all.

If there is once piece of advice I could give to men who are interested in contributing their skills to the important fight against human trafficking it would be this: talk less, listen more. (Says the guy writing a blog!)

When men start thinking that they are called to bust down the doors of brothels and rush in to save the day, they are often committing the same fundamental crime against women that human traffickers have already committed—the only difference is that instead of treating a women as if she is a thing to be sold, they are treating her as a thing to be saved.

Our goal should be to demonstrate the type of equality that will make the notion of a trade in women un-imaginable to our children.

If my male peers and I learn to respect women as we work together to end this problem, we will create a world where our daughters and sons will not be able to fathom the type of gender inequality that contributes to sex trafficking today.